When people talk deep "litter" they're not talking about cat litter but natural, organic materials like grass clippings, straw, hay, dead leaves, pine needles and other garden or landscape debris. The chicken poo drops to the ground below, out of sight and decomposes. No odor, nothing to attract flies.

We use the Deep Litter Method in our run with the above mentioned materials and has worked out very well. We continue to add materials through out the year as it breaks down, then do a complete clean out in the spring. The result is some beautiful compost for the garden.

I'd never made that connection before, but it's easy to see how one would. Kitty litter, deep litter. Both do serve the same purpose, but are simply different materials. Not that much different, as it turns out, as some are using sand as their chicken litter medium and sift through it to filter the droppings, much as cat owners do their litter boxes.